OLD TOWN — Steve McClellan, a former 43rd Ward aldermanic candidate, said he has filed a complaint with the Independent Police Review Authority after officers allegedly threatened him with violence during a traffic stop in Old Town.
McClellan said he was on his way to buy a cable at Best Buy around 8:45 p.m. Tuesday when he was stopped by police at North Avenue and Larrabee Street.
The officers told McClellan that they pulled him over for not wearing a seatbelt.
During the stop, McClellan said the officers threatened him with violence and he was afraid for his life. It wasn't until McClellan showed officers his identification that they stopped shouting at him and threatening him, he said.
A Chicago Police spokesman could not immediately confirm McClellan's account Thursday.
Officers eventually found a small amount of marijuana in McClellan's glove box, so they took him to the Near North District police station, McClellan said.
McClellan argued he never should've been pulled over in the first place. He said he was a victim of racial profiling.
"There's no way in hell I should have been pulled over," he said. "It was 100 percent racial profiling. The officer thought I was a thug. I had my snapback hat on."
McClellan, an Old Town resident of 10 years, ran for alderman of the 43rd Ward last year but was ultimately knocked off the ballot when the Chicago Board of Elections determined that he didn't have enough of the needed signatures to run.
He runs after-school programming at Chicago Public Schools, where he's known as "Coach Steve" to students. He's on the Local School Council at LaSalle Language Academy and part of the neighborhood group Lincoln Central Association.
"I wanted to say, 'You've got the wrong guy.' This is my neighborhood. I take pride in this," he said. "I call in when I see potholes. When I see little girls being harassed by little boys, I go over and ask them if everything is OK."
So far, McClellan has filed a complaint with IPRA, the investigative agency that oversees police.
A spokeswoman for IPRA said the incident happened too recently to provide any information on the investigation.
"I want to be the person who serves this community," McClellan said. "That's why it hurt so much when I saw the little kids I play basketball walking by [during the incident.] I've always been a community man."
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